THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN MANAGING AND LEADING CHANGE

Again, I m not the expert on leadership or organizational change. However, I have personally led organizational changes, and have been led through change by a rare few people whom I can justify calling leaders . I can tell you this: despite what the literature might tell you, organizational change cannot be managed; it can only be led. When you think about it, the phrase change management is an oxymoron.

There is a difference between managing and leading and that difference is as pure and simple as the definitions for those two words. By definition, managing involves maintaining the status quo, not letting words, thoughts, or behaviors deviate too far from the acceptable norm. In contrast, leading is willfully causing deviation from the status quo. Leading involves instigating the movement to get outside of the status quo; leading is the act of causing perturbation to a system that is static and in equilibrium so that it can morph into a better system. Management involves mitigating risk; leadership involves creating and taking risks. Management involves winning through complying with the rules; leadership often involves sometimes breaking the rules and frequently changing them.

In CMMI-based process improvement, your organization will be best served by a mix of leaders and managers. You will need managers who know how to use proven project and program management methods and tools to be in charge of the requirements, planning, design, training, and implementation of the processes and process improvement. You will also need leaders who inspire , encourage , and stand out in front of the organization as the first courageous examples of the new attitudes and behaviors.

The one thing we all need to come to grips with is the simple, observable fact that you can t find leaders by looking at the organizational chart. Positions, titles, and roles do not indicate leadership ability; sometimes just the opposite . Sometimes, the more important the title or the higher the position in the organizational chart, the more likely you ll find followers than leaders just because the rules of corporate America say that you move up by saying yes and by playing by the rules. Conversely, managers have people reporting to them, so the organization chart is a decent map for finding where managers live in the organization. Figure 7.1 illustrates the concept that leaders can be found in almost any strata, role, position, or title within the organization.

Figure 7.1: Finding Where Leaders Live in the Organization